1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to devices and methods for pre-combustion treatment of hydrocarbon fuels to promote fuel efficiency of internal combustion engines and to reduce engine exhaust pollutants, and more particularly it relates to such devices and methods that apply heat and a magnetic field to fuel as it is supplied through a fuel intake line to a fuel-injected gasoline or diesel internal combustion engine.
2. General Background
Various methods and devices have been disclosed that use one or more permanent magnets to apply a magnetic field to combustible fuel in order to improve combustion efficiency and to reduce engine exhaust pollutants. Flow of liquid, hydrocarbon fuel through a magnetic field, under the right conditions, can promote ionization of components of the fuel and/or an orientation effect on polar molecules in the fuel allowing them to stay in suspension, leading to more complete combustion of fuel in an internal combustion engine. One approach has been to affix permanent magnets to the exterior of a fuel intake line; exemplary of this approach are U.S. Pat. No. 4,188,296 to E. Fujita; U.S. Pat. No. 4,572,145 to J. Mitchell; U.S. Pat. No. 5,124,045 to A. Janczak et al.; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,129,382 to R. Stamps, Sr., et al. A second approach has been to position one or more permanent magnets internally within the fuel intake line so that, during engine operation, fuel streams past the magnets. In the second approach, a ferromagnetic casing has sometimes been provided that surrounded the magnets to help concentrate the magnetic flux lines to the region of fuel flow. Exemplary of the second approach are U.S. Pat. No. 4,050,426 to C. Sanderson; U.S. Pat. No. 4,538,582 to K. Wakuta; U.S. Pat. No. 6,851,413 to R. Tamol, Sr.; U.S. Pat. No. 4,865,730 to B. Lam; and U.S. Pat. No. 7,004,153 to W. Lisseveld. When retrofitting an engine with such magnetic devices, the first approach has the advantage that it does not require severance of the engine fuel intake line to install the device, whereas the second approach does require severance of the fuel line in order to interpose the device within the fuel intake line. On the other hand, the second approach has the advantage that it facilitates a more complete penetration of the flowing fuel by the applied magnetic field, compared to the first approach. Accordingly, the present invention takes the second approach because experimentation has established that a thoroughly penetrating, very high magnetic flux density—considerably higher than has been advocated by above-referenced disclosures—is important to achieving a significant improvement in fuel combustion efficiency.
Experimentation further established that heating the fuel to a temperature within the range 82° C. (180° F.) to 104° C. (220° F.) prior to, or at the same time as, application of a magnetic field to the fuel, is also important to gain combustion efficiency. In the present invention, whereas only relatively modest improvements in efficiency were obtained from application of a magnetic field to unheated fuel (zero to perhaps 10%), a magnetic field applied to heated, flowing fuel according to the method and apparatus of the invention dramatically and unexpectedly improved fuel efficiency by 40 percent or more. Thus, critical to the success of the invention is the combination of heating the fuel into the required temperature range together with application of a very strong magnetic field to the flowing, heated fuel. It was further determined experimentally that, for maximum combustion efficiency, at least one pair of spaced-apart, permanent magnets are required to create an efficiency-enhancing, magnetic field, which magnets should have their south poles—or alternatively, their north poles—facing toward each other along an axis that is aligned generally with the overall direction of flow of fuel through the magnetic field.
Preheating the fuel or fuel mixture before it entered an engine cylinder for combustion has been proposed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,524,746 E. Hansen; and U.S. Pat. No. 4,672,938 to L. Hoppie et al. More pertinent to the present invention, however, is U.S. Pat. No. 7,478,764 to D. Lee, which disclosed a method and apparatus for reforming a hydrocarbon fuel by application of both heat and a magnetic field to flowing fuel, which was said to lead to improved combustibility and reduction of by-products. Exhaust gases from an engine exhaust manifold were conducted through a reaction vessel. Fuel flowing from a fuel tank through an annular plenum of a fuel injection assembly within the reaction vessel, together with air derived from an air inlet, was heated by the exhaust gases; from there, the fuel-air mixture flowed into an engine intake manifold. Disposed axially within the injection assembly was a reactor rod comprised of materials that are both magnetic as well as catalytic for hydrocarbon cracking. The preheating of the fuel-air mixture was said to completely vaporize the fuel by the time the fuel encountered the reactor rod. The annular plenum had a constrained flow region in order to accelerate the flow rate and thereby increase the velocity and kinetic energy of the fuel molecules, which was said to facilitate cracking of the fuel and formation of plasma, ions and free radicals. An electromagnetic field in and around the reactor rod generated by the flow of the ions was said to cause the reactor rod to develop a magnetic field.
Although hot engine exhaust gases could be used to heat fuel according to the method of the present invention, in a preferred embodiment of the present invention flowing fuel is heated by transfer of heat from hot engine coolant instead because this is generally a more convenient source of heat for this purpose and less costly to install when retrofitting existing internal combustion engines. It is a simple matter of diverting engine coolant to and from the fuel treatment device of the instant invention by suitably sized segments of engine coolant hose. The present invention is further distinguishable from Lee's, in that Lee does not teach the use of north pole-to-north pole nor south pole-to-south pole disposed pairs of magnets of very high magnetic strength to create a magnetic field for treating flowing fuel; nor does Lee's nor any of the other devices and methods known to the applicant apply such a magnetic field to heated fuel that is conducted through the magnetic field in a dual helical path, as described herein below. In further contrast to the present invention, disclosures of prior fuel treatment devices that use a pair of spaced-apart magnets to apply a magnetic field to fuel supplied through a fuel intake line to an internal combustion engine have generally insisted that the magnets should have their opposite poles disposed opposite one another; see, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,490,593 to C. Turi, at column 2, lines 34-42. But, it is the combination of heating the fuel to 82° C. (180° F.) to 104° C. (220° F.), together with application to the heated fuel of a magnetic field that is generated by a pair of spaced-apart, same-poles-facing, high strength magnets, in further combination with conducting the heated fuel within the magnetic field through a dual helical pathway, that achieves the significant boost in fuel combustion efficiency that is reported herein.